Mockingjay: Alternate Ending
by MontanaDolphin
Summary: This is the way I think the book should have ended, with more flourish, and more personal exchanges between characters.


**Author's Note: All the bold type is my work. Otherwise, I kept the original writings of Suzanne Collins, which you see in regular type, to continue the flow of the story. I in no way claim any of the writing you see that is not in bold. It is the soul property of Suzanne Collins, her publishers, and whoever else owns the copyright. I begin my alternate ending during Chapter 27, after Katniss is taken back to District 12.**

27

Sometimes the phone rings and rings and rings, but I don't pick it up. Haymitch never visits. Maybe he changed his mind and left, although I suspect he's just drunk. No one comes but Greasy Sae and her granddaughter. After months of solitary confinement, they seem like a crowd.

"Spring's in the air today. You ought to get out," she says. "Go hunting."

I haven't left the house. I haven't even left the kitchen except to go to the small bathroom a few steps off of it. I'm in the same clothes I left the Capitol in. What I do is sit by the fire. Stare at the unopened letters piling up on the mantel. "I don't have a bow."

"Check down the hall," she says.

After she leaves, I consider a trip down the hall. Rule it out. But after several hours, I go anyway, walking in silent sock feet, so as not to awaken the ghosts. In the study, where I had my tea with President Snow, I find a box with my father's hunting jacket, our plant book, my parents' wedding photo, the spile Haymitch sent in, and the locket Peeta gave me in the clock arena. The two bows and a sheath of arrows Gale rescued on the night of the firebombing lie on the desk. **Sitting next to the bow is a small pillow, Peeta's pearl resting in the center. ****I put on the hunting jacket, put the pearl in the pocket, and leave the rest of the stuff untouched.**

I fall asleep on the sofa in the formal living room. A terrible nightmare follows, where I'm lying at the bottom of a deep grave, and every dead person I know by name comes by and throws a shovel full of ashes on me. It's quite a long dream, considering the list of people, and the deeper I'm buried, the harder it is to breathe. I try to call out, begging them to stop, but the ashes fill my mouth and nose and I can't make any sound. Still the shovel scrapes on and on and on...

I wake with a start. Pale morning light comes around the edges of the shutters. The scraping of the shovel continues. Still half in the nightmare, I run down the hall, out the front door, and around the side of the house, because now I'm pretty sure I can scream at the dead. When I see him, I pull up short. His face is flushed from digging up the ground under the windows. In a wheelbarrow are five scraggly bushes.

"You're back," I say.

"Dr. Aurelius wouldn't let me leave the Capitol until yesterday," Peeta says. "By the way, he said to tell you he can't keep pretending he's treating you forever. You have to pick up the phone."

He looks well. Thin and covered with burn scars like me, but his eyes have lost that clouded, tortured look. He's frowning slightly, though, as he takes me in. I make a halfhearted effort to push my hair out of my eyes and realize it's matted into clumps. I feel defensive. "What are you doing?"

"I went to the woods this morning and dug these up. For her," he says. "I thought we could plant them along the side of the house."

I look at the bushes, the clods of dirt hanging from their roots, and catch my breath as the word rose registers. I'm about to yell vicious things at Peeta when the full name comes to me. Not plain rose but evening primrose. The flower my sister was named for. I give Peeta a nod of assent and hurry back into the house, locking the door behind me. But the evil thing is inside, not out. Trembling with weakness and anxiety, I run up the stairs. My foot catches on the last step and I crash onto the floor. I force myself to rise and enter my room. The smell's very faint but still laces the air. It's there. The white rose among the dried flowers in the vase. Shriveled and fragile, but holding on to that unnatural perfection cultivated in Snow's greenhouse. I grab the vase, stumble down to the kitchen, and throw its contents into the embers. As the flowers flare up, a burst of blue flame envelops the rose and devours it. Fire beats roses again. I smash the vase on the floor for good measure. Back upstairs, I throw open the bedroom windows to clear out the rest of Snow's stench. But it still lingers, on my clothes and in my pores. I strip, and flakes of skin the size of playing cards cling to the garments. Avoiding the mirror, I step into the shower and scrub the roses from my hair, my body, my mouth. Bright pink and tingling, I find something clean to wear. It takes half an hour to comb out my hair. **I retrieve the pearl from my father's hunting ****jacket and put it in my pocket. **Greasy Sae unlocks the front door. While she makes breakfast, I feed the clothes I had shed to the fire. At her suggestion, I pare off my nails with a knife.

Over the eggs, I ask her, "Where did Gale go?"

"District Two. Got some fancy job there. I see him now and again on the television," she says.

I dig around inside myself, trying to register anger, hatred, longing. I find only relief.

"I'm going hunting today," I say.

"Well, I wouldn't mind some fresh game at that," she answers.

I arm myself with a bow and arrows and head out, intending to exit 12 through the Meadow. Near the square are teams of masked and gloved people with horse-drawn carts. Sifting through what lay under the snow this winter. Gathering remains. A cart's parked in front of the mayor's house. I recognize Thom, Gale's old crewmate, pausing a moment to wipe the sweat from his face with a rag. I remember seeing him in 13, but he must have come back. His greeting gives me the courage to ask, "Did they find anyone in there?"

"Whole family. And the two people who worked for them," Thom tells me.

Madge. Quiet and kind and brave. The girl who gave me the pin that gave me a name. I swallow hard. Wonder if she'll be joining the cast of my nightmares tonight. Shoveling the ashes into my mouth. "I thought maybe, since he was the mayor..."

"I don't think being the mayor of Twelve put the odds in his favor," says Thom.

I nod and keep moving, careful not to look in the back of the cart. All through the town and the Seam, it's the same. The reaping of the dead. As I near the ruins of my old house, the road becomes thick with carts. The Meadow's gone, or at least dramatically altered. A deep pit has been dug, and they're lining it with bones, a mass grave for my people. I skirt around the hole and enter the woods at my usual place. It doesn't matter, though. The fence isn't charged anymore and has been propped up with long branches to keep out the predators. But old habits die hard. I think about going to the lake, but I'm so weak that I barely make it to my meeting place with Gale. I sit on the rock where Cressida filmed us, but it's too wide without his body beside me. Several times I close my eyes and count to ten, thinking that when I open them, he will have materialized without a sound as he so often did. I have to remind myself that Gale's in 2 with a fancy job, probably kissing another pair of lips.

It is the old Katniss's favorite kind of day. Early spring. The woods awakening after the long winter. But the spurt of energy that began with the primroses fades away. **By the time I make it back to the fence, I'm so sick ****and dizzy, I can't make it back to my house. I lean my back up against a tree, my fingers rolling the pearl ****in my pocket back and forth. I close my eyes, needing to rest for just a bit before I try to make it home.**

**I'm awakened by someone saying my name.**

"**Katniss?"**

**I open my eyes and see Peeta looking at me, concern showing plainly on his face. I try to stand up, but my ****head starts to spin and I have to sit back down. Peeta rushes over to help me back up.**

"**Come on, I'll help you home." He puts his arm around my waist to steady me, and we slowly walk towards ****the Victor's Village.**

"**I tried to come see you after they took you into custody," Peeta says. "But every time I tried, the guards ****wouldn't let me anywhere near your room."**

**I remembered how I had thought I heard voices arguing during the first few weeks of my confinement. I ****remain silent, my head staring at the ground while we walk.**

"**I just wanted you to know that, Katniss. I don't want you to think I didn't try," Peeta says.**

**We make it to my house, and Peeta helps me to the sofa in the living room, where I watch the dust motes ****spin in the thin shafts of afternoon light as he turns and leaves, closing the door behind him.**

My head snaps around at the hiss, but it takes awhile to believe he's real. How could he have gotten here? I take in the claw marks from some wild animal, the back paw he holds slightly above the ground, the prominent bones in his face. He's come on foot, then, all the way from 13. Maybe they kicked him out or maybe he just bones in his face. He's come on foot, then, all the way from 13. Maybe they kicked him out or maybe he just couldn't stand it there without her, so he came looking.

"It was the waste of a trip. She's not here," I tell him. Buttercup hisses again. "She's not here. You can hiss all you like. You won't find Prim." At her name, he perks up. Raises his flattened ears. Begins to meow hopefully. "Get out!" He dodges the pillow I throw at him. "Go away! There's nothing left for you here!" I start to shake, furious with him. "She's not coming back! She's never ever coming back here again!" I grab another pillow and get to my feet to improve my aim. Out of nowhere, the tears begin to pour down my cheeks. "She's dead." I clutch my middle to dull the pain. Sink down on my heels, rocking the pillow, crying. "She's dead, you stupid cat. She's dead." A new sound, part crying, part singing, comes out of my body, giving voice to my despair. Buttercup begins to wail as well. No matter what I do, he won't go. He circles me, just out of reach, as wave after wave of sobs racks my body, until eventually I fall unconscious. But he must understand. He must know that the unthinkable has happened and to survive will require previously unthinkable acts. Because hours later, when I come to in my bed, he's there in the moonlight. Crouched beside me, yellow eyes alert, guarding me from the night.

In the morning, he sits stoically as I clean the cuts, but digging the thorn from his paw brings on a round of those kitten mews. We both end up crying again, only this time we comfort each other. On the strength of this, I open the letter Haymitch gave me from my mother, dial the phone number, and weep with her as well. Peeta, bearing a warm loaf of bread, shows up with Greasy Sae. She makes us breakfast and I feed all my bacon to Buttercup.

Slowly, with many lost days, I come back to life. I try to follow Dr. Aurelius's advice, just going through the motions, amazed when one finally has meaning again. I tell him my idea about the book, and a large box of parchment sheets arrives on the next train from the Capitol.

I got the idea from our family's plant book. The place where we recorded those things you cannot trust to memory. The page begins with the person's picture. A photo if we can find it. If not, a sketch or painting by Peeta. Then, in my most careful handwriting, come all the details it would be a crime to forget. Lady licking Prim's cheek. My father's laugh. Peeta's father with the cookies. The color of Finnick's eyes. What Cinna could do with a length of silk. Boggs reprogramming the Holo. Rue poised on her toes, arms slightly extended, like a bird about to take flight. On and on. We seal the pages with salt water and promises to live well to make their deaths count. Haymitch finally joins us, contributing twenty-three years of tributes he was forced to mentor. Additions become smaller. An old memory that surfaces. A late primrose preserved between the pages. Strange bits of happiness, like the photo of Finnick and Annie's newborn son.

We learn to keep busy again. Peeta bakes. Haymitch drinks until the liquor runs out, and then raises geese until the next train arrives. Fortunately, the geese can take pretty good care of themselves. We're not alone. A few hundred others return because, whatever has happened, this is our home. With the mines closed, they plow the ashes into the earth and plant food. Machines from the Capitol break ground for a new factory where we will make medicines. Although no one seeds it, the Meadow turns green again.

**One early afternoon I decide to try and go hunting again, since after that day Peeta found me under the ****tree, I haven't gone back. I make my way past the meadow and enter the woods at my usual place. I head ****towards the lake without even thinking about it, and I stop short. Sitting on the rock where Cressida filmed ****us, is Gale.**

**He turns at my sharp intake of breath. "Hey, Catnip," he says.**

"**Gale! What are you doing here?" I ask as I take a seat next to him. My hand goes in my pocket, ****fingering the pearl.**

"**Would you believe me if I said I was just in the neighborhood?" Gale asks with a wry smile.**

"**No, not really." I say.**

"**I didn't think so," Gale says. After a long pause, "I wanted to see you, to see how you've been. I made it ****as far as your front door. I guess I was scared you might slam it in my face, so I came here instead, where ****I can at least picture you, before the uprising, before the war. Before you didn't hate me." He reaches down ****and plucks a dandelion from the ground, spinning it in his fingers. "Before I didn't hate myself."**

**I watch the dandelion, dancing, spinning. I see a different dandelion, plucked by my own fingers. A boy ****and a bakery. Bread.**

"**I don't hate you, Gale, not anymore," I say. And it was true. I didn't realize it until now, but as I search ****my feelings regarding Gale, there is longing, regret, loneliness...but there is no hate. "I did hate you. I ****blamed you for killing Pri...her. But you aren't the one who sent that hovercraft. You aren't the one who ****ordered those parachutes to drop. It was Coin, not you."**

"**But the bombs..." Gale starts to say.**

**I cut him off. "The bombs may have been made by you, but you did not drop them into a group of ****children," I say. "There is no way you could have known Coin would give an order like that. Nor could ****you have known that Pri...she...would be there." The thought of Prim still causes a stabbing pain in my ****heart, but not as sharp as it had been. At least now when I think of her, I can do so and still breathe.**

**We sit in silence for a while. Gale finally looks up, his eyes searching mine. "I miss you, Catnip. More ****than you can imagine," Gale says before looking away, out into the distance. He continues, "I try to stay ****busy, but nothing dulls the pain. And now that things are pretty much back to normal, I find I have more ****free time on my hands than I can handle. I haven't been able to hunt...I've tried, but it just doesn't feel ****right, not without you by my side. And I see you everywhere...in the grass, in the trees...in my dreams." ****he ends in a whisper, his head falling down as his shoulders slump, as if in defeat.**

**I don't know what to say. Gale speaks of longing associated with being in love. I love Gale, but I can't be ****sure how deep that love is. If it's the same kind of love he feels for me. I finger the pearl with the hand ****that's still in my pocket. After a moment or two, I come to a decision.**

**I wipe away the tear sliding silently down his cheek. I cup my finger under his chin, pulling him up from ****his misery. I pull him to me, and place my lips on his. They are soft, his lips. And warm.**

**I wait for a stirring, a hunger. None comes.**

**I break away. With my hand on his cheek, I look into his eyes. "I love you Gale, but not the way you want ****me to. I long for those days, hunting together, laughing, sitting quietly here in our place," I say. "But it's ****because I miss my best friend, my confidant. I wish we could go back to those days...before so many people ****that I loved and cared for died. But we can't go back. We can never be like we once were. Too much has ****happened. Too much pain, too much sadness, too much loss." My heart breaks from the hurt I see in his ****eyes.**

"**I know," Gale says, trying his best to hold back tears that continue to stream down his face. "But I can't ****lose you, Catnip. Not completely. I don't think I could go on without having you in my life." He brushes a ****stray lock of hair out of my eyes. "I know we can never be as close as we once were, but maybe we can at ****least try to reclaim some of the friendship we once had."**

**I wrap my arms around him, hugging him to me. "We can try," I whisper, as my own tears begin to fall. **"**And I'm sorry, Gale. I'm sorry I can't love you the way you want me to."**

**Gale leans back, smiling at me sadly. "I know you are," he says. He looks down at the dandelion, still in ****his hand, and places it behind my ear. After a moment, he says, "It's Peeta you're in love with, isn't it?"**

"**I don't know, Gale. I don't know if I'm capable of being in love with anyone," I say. "I'm damaged." I spin ****the pearl between my fingers.**

"**Aren't we all?" Gale says.**

**We sit together in our spot, watching the sun set over the mountains. As we make our way back to the ****district, we walk in a comfortable silence, both of us happy to have each other back. Gale leaves for ****District 2, but says he'll be back in the summer. He's going to ask to be transferred to District 12, even ****though he'll have to be demoted to do it, since he's Master of Security in District 2, and it's not likely that ****Kismit, who holds that position here, will be willing to step down and allow Gale to take his place.**

**Once home, I greet Greasy Sae who is in the kitchen, cleaning up the stove.**

"**Did you bring anything back from your hunt?" Greasy Sae asks.**

"**No, not today. I saw Gale." I say.**

"**I figured you might. I saw him heading towards the meadow when I was on my here this morning."**

**I tell her briefly about my conversation with Gale, leaving most of it out, but telling her that Gale will be ****back in the summer. I then eat a quick meal...Haymitch and Peeta ate at Haymitch's without me since I ****got home so late...and head upstairs. I take a shower, enjoying the hot water streaming down my back. I ****don't look in the mirror anymore, to sickened by the form that is my body. The burns have left my body ****covered in every shade of pink you can imagine. But the worst part is that any time I see the burns, I think ****of Prim.**

**I put on my sleeping clothes and open my bedroom window. It was very warm today and my room is stuffy. ****I climb into bed and drift off to sleep.**

**I wake up screaming, images of the nightmare fresh in my mind. I begin to sob, the pain of the loss in my ****nightmare too much to bear. It was Peeta. We were back in the Capitol, running from the hissing mutts ****that were after us...after me. We are in the shaft, climbing the ladder, Gale telling me to move, to climb up. ****I hear screaming coming from the shaft. I tell Gale there's someone down there, he tells me it's too late. I ****shine my light down into the shaft...and instead of Finnick, I see Peeta struggling as a mutt clamps it's jaws ****around Peeta's neck and rips.**

**I bolt out of bed. I run out of my room, not bothering to grab my robe, and dash out the door. Without ****bothering to knock, I fling open Peeta's front door. "Peeta!" I cry.**

**Peeta rushes out of his bedroom, his hair disheveled, sleep heavy eyes searching for me in the dim light. **"**Katniss?"**

**I let out a sob and run to him. "Peeta, Peeta," I say, my voice breaking as I cling to him. His strong arms ****wrap around me and he holds me close.**

"**It's ok, Katniss. It's ok. Shh," Peeta says, stroking my hair as I continue to sob.**

"**They killed you, Peeta! Those lizard mutts...they killed you! They ripped your head off!" I say.**

"**It was a nightmare, Katniss. It wasn't real. It was Finnick, not me. It wasn't real. I'm here." Peeta says.**

**I pull back, out of his arms. I look at him, searching his eyes. "Kiss me, Peeta." I say.**

"**W-what?" Peeta says, confused.**

"**Please, Peeta!" I say desperately. "Kiss me, Peeta! Please..." I beg, sobbing.**

**Peeta, lightning fast, pulls my face to his and kisses me. His lips, always warm, always soft, are on mine, ****and I feel that thing again, the hunger that overtook me on the beach. I wrap my arms around his neck, ****returning the kiss as I savor that hunger.**

**After a moment, Peeta pulls away, hands still on my cheeks. His expression is one of confusion, and what ****I think is fear. His eyes search mine. "You love me." Peeta says, pain and desperation in his voice. "Real...or not real?"**

"**Real," I say. "Oh, Peeta, real! Real!" I pull him back into the kiss, and this time I not only feel the hunger, ****but a searing heat coursing through me, into my limbs, into my heart. It's a feeling that...I know this now... ****I could never experience with Gale. **That what I need to survive is not Gale's fire, kindled with rage and hatred. What I need is the dandelion in the spring. The bright yellow that means rebirth instead of destruction. The promise that life can go on, no matter how bad our losses. That it can be good again.** And ****only Peeta can give me that, for he is the only one who can truly transform me into the Girl on Fire.**

28

Epilogue

They play in the Meadow. The dancing girl with the dark hair and blue eyes. The boy with blond curls and gray eyes, struggling to keep up with her on his chubby toddler legs. It took five, ten, fifteen years for me to agree. But Peeta wanted them so badly. When I first felt her stirring inside of me, I was consumed with a terror that felt as old as life itself. Only the joy of holding her in my arms could tame it. Carrying him was a little easier, but not much.

**Her name is Prim. His name is Finnick.**

**Gale moved back to District 12 just like he said he would. It was hard at first, having him back. Seeing ****the pain in his eyes when he would see Peeta and I together, knowing there was nothing I could do to ****ease his suffering. But slowly, Gale healed. I have Johanna to thank for that.**

**A year after Gale returned, Johanna came to District 12. I wouldn't say we were ever truly friends, but I ****was the only person who could have come close to being someone she cared about, I think. She had no ****family, no one left to love. She was lonely. And so was Gale. They were married that spring.**

**We still hunt together, Gale and I. We take Johanna with us sometimes, but only if it's not raining because ****she still relives the terror of the torture done to her in the Capitol all those years ago. On rainy days, she ****stays with Peeta, helping him bake.**

**Haymitch died last winter. The healers had told him his liver was failing from all the drinking over the last ****few decades. He died in his bed, surrounded by those he loved, and those who loved him. Peeta. Gale. ****Johanna. And me. I held his hand, singing to him as he went. "That's nice, sweetheart," Haymitch says. And ****when he takes his last breath, he's smiling.**

**Peeta and I grew back together after that night I admitted my love for him. **There are still moments when he clutches the back of a chair and hangs on until the flashbacks are over.** It happens a lot less, now. And ****usually, one look at the pearl, now hanging from a silver chain around my neck, is all it takes for him to break ****away from the terror.**

I wake screaming from nightmares of mutts and lost children.** Of poison fog. Blood rain. And more often than ****not, white roses. But Peeta's arms are there to comfort me, and always, his lips.**

**I watch as my children continue to frolic in the Meadow. **The questions are just beginning. The arenas have been completely destroyed, the memorials built, there are no more Hunger Games. But they teach about them at school, and the girl knows we played a role in them. The boy will know in a few years. How can I tell them about that world without frightening them to death? My children, who take the words of the song for granted:

_Deep in the meadow, under the willow_

_A bed of grass, a soft green pillow_

_Lay down your head, and close your sleepy eyes_

_And when again they open, the sun will rise._

_Here it's safe, here it's warm_

_Here the daisies guard you from every harm_

_Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true_

_Here is the place where I love you._

My children, who don't know they play on a graveyard.

Peeta says it will be okay. We have each other. And the book. We can make them understand in a way that will make them braver. But one day I'll have to explain about my nightmares. Why they came. Why they won't ever really go away.

I'll tell them how I survive it. I'll tell them that on bad mornings, it feels impossible to take pleasure in anything because I'm afraid it could be taken away. That's when I make a list in my head of every act of goodness I've seen someone do. It's like a game. Repetitive. Even a little tedious after more than twenty years.

But there are much worse games to play.

**I turn to Peeta as he sits by my side, a smile on his face as he watches our children. "You love me," I say. **"**Real, or not real?"**

"**Real," Peeta says, turning to look at me with adoration in his eyes, and love, so much love. He brings my ****face to his and puts his lips on mine.**

**There's that hunger again.**

"**Will you stay with me?" Peeta asks me, a playful smile on his lips.**

"**Always." I say.**

THE END


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